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Supra successor may be all-electric sourced from Tesla; MR2 returning too?

Rumors of a revival of the Toyota Supra and MR2 have been swirling for years right up until just this week when high-level Toyota employees all but confirmed their return.
But now The Detroit Bureau has put together news from different sources suggesting that the next Supra might be all electric. The report cites recent comments from Toyota senior executives hinting at plans to work with Tesla on a new joint project. The FT-HS Concept (shown above) seems a logical inspiration for a new Supra.
And on the other side of the equation is Tesla's design chief Franz von Holzhausen who was quoted last year saying his company was looking at its next project, probably a sports car, that would follow next year's intro of the Model X. He went on to suggest the car would compete directly with BMW's 3 Series, which, in coupe form, could be a worthy competitor to a Supra as well.

Tesla begins selling in China, despite lack of formal company name

Car buyers in China can now start shopping for a new Tesla Model S. Only problem is, the California-based automaker doesn't seem to have hammered down a brand name for that market. According to Reuters, Tesla is still dealing with a trademark squatter for "Tesla" (or "Te Si La"), so in the meantime, it is a brand without a name.
Tesla has launched a website in China under the Tousule name, but it doesn't appear that will be the official nomenclature for cars sold in China. According to the report, a Tesla salesman in Beijing doesn't know when - or even if - Tesla plans to come up with a Chinese name for its brand. We reached out to Tesla for a comment on the matter, but we've yet to receive any response regarding this ongoing situation in China.

Musk: Tesla's first battery swap station to open before end of year

For us, the lede was certainly buried in this Automotive News post about the new Tesla D models. In a casual way, AN lets us know that, Tesla CEO Elon Musk "said that Tesla plans to open its first [battery swap] station, between Los Angeles and San Francisco, within the next two months." Well, that's news, isn't it? The last time we hear anything official about the Model S swap stations, which can replace an empty battery pack with a full one in just 90 seconds, was a long time ago. Tesla first showed off the technology in June of 2013 and claimed that the first station would open in California in the fourth quarter of 2013. Since then it's been ... quiet as the electric vehicle company was busy with other projects. In fact, while Tesla was busy getting the D ready, starting to sell the Model S in a number of new countries and working on the Gigafactory as well as new models, some people were thinking that the whole battery swap stations were a hoax, despite that demonstration with journalists in attendance and a series of questions answered. Now that we're 60 days away from the first battery swap station – available, as always, in California first – we're excited to see how it actually works in the real world.